More Than a Checklist

When I first arrived at MTI, I came to do a job.

Yes, working with TCKs has always been my dream, and I was thrilled to finally step into it. Yet I expected to treat the summer like a checklist: gain knowledge, build teaching experience, earn internship credits, and return to my last year of undergrad with one more box ticked.

This is what we TCKs do, right? We carry a lived worldview, move easily between cultures, and often feel marked for high accomplishment. We make decisions without flinching at goodbyes or hellos. I showed up eager to work and learn, but with a determination to keep my distance.

By the end of the first week, I knew that was going to be impossible.

At MTI, participants learn practical skills like language acquisition and cultural adaptation, but they are also invited to learn about themselves – to see where God is at work in their heart. That kind of learning requires openness, vulnerability, and a willingness to believe God is doing something deeper than the job you came to do.

This openness showed up in moments I didn’t expect, even in the classroom. One afternoon, I told the children how Baby Jesus moved many times with His family, making Him a TCK. A little girl lit up and exclaimed, “Jesus has a swirly heart – just like me!”. In our program, a “swirly heart” is how we describe the blend of cultures that make a TCK who they are. Watching her connect her own swirly heart to the heart of Jesus was a holy moment – proof that even the youngest can understand the beauty of being fully known by God.

For me, this summer meant loosening my grip on the version of my TCK story I usually told: the simplified, cheerful one that kept me from sounding ungrateful. The one that left out the paradox, the loss, and the moments of cultural dissonance. For the first time, I was invited to voice the harder truths – and to see how God could work through them. I realized that my hesitancy to bring my whole story into my internship mirrored my hesitancy to believe God could redeem the hardest parts of my TCK experience. But the staff at MTI didn’t just track my internship hours and assign the right books. They tended to my story. They helped me be honest about the grief and to give thanks for the beauty.

And in that safe space, I began to trust that God could hold my whole heart – swirls, paradox, and all.